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Rachel Heffner-Burns

Rachel Heffner-Burns is currently pursuing a PhD in English at Lehigh University where she studies American poetry and poetics in connection with American religious history. Her dissertation examines the poetry of Walt Whitman, Langston Hughes, and H.D., and how they adapted their former experiences with particular religious cultures as a means of effecting cultural change through their political verse. Formerly a teaching fellow in Lehigh's first year writing program, Rachel is currently an adjunct faculty member of the English Department at Norwalk Community College. At NCC, she designs and teaches first year composition classes and developmental workshops for first-generation, low-income undergraduates. She feels strongly that her work in the community college humanities classroom, instructing the diverse members of NCC's student body, extends and compliments her academic studies of literature and social justice.